Then there is Linley, with its stately avenues leading up towards hills which have been mined for lead ever since the Romans were there. Amongst these hills stands Hyssington, which we will take leave to visit, though it lies away outside our county, over the Welsh frontier. Anent the church at Hyssington there is a curious tradition. Long, long ago, in the old Popish days, an enormous Bull made his appearance at Hyssington, and grew bigger and bigger every day, until the good people of the neighbourhood went in fear of their lives by reason of the dreaded monster. At last things came to such a pass that the parson made up his mind to try heroic measures. So with book, bell and candle, he sallied forth in quest of the Bull, and, by reading of appropriate texts, managed to reduce the uncanny beast to such dimensions as would admit of his being driven into the church. But alack! before the creature could be finally extinguished, parson's candle had burnt out; and ere morning came, when the reading could be resumed, the Bull had swelled out again, until his huge body cracked the church walls from top to bottom! Such is the veracious legend; but whether this Bull hailed from the Emerald Isle, or belonged to that species known as Papal Bulls, history recordeth not; but the cracks in the church walls long remained to confound the incredulous. Continuing our perambulation we come presently to Church-Stoke, a pleasant looking village of half-timbered houses seated on the river Camlad, one of them bearing upon its gable-end the inscription, WHAT . IS . HERE . BY . MAN . ERECTED : LET . IT . BE . BY . GOD . PROTECTED : IOHN . MIDDLETON . GENT . AN . DO . 1685 : ÆTATIS . SUÆ . 27 . R . T . C : Returning direct across the hills to Bishop's Castle, we pass through Broughton, where, it is believed, the Romans had a station. Offa's Dyke, crossing the hills to the westward, runs near to Mainstone, a village supposed to acquire its name from a large granite stone standing near the west gate of the churchyard. From time immemorial it has been the custom for the village youths to test their strength by heaving this stone aloft, and then casting it backwards over the left shoulder. The name of Mainstone, it may be observed, shews the tendency to reduplication in place-names, for Maen is the Welsh for stone. A still more curious instance is that of Dollymase-meadow, near Gloucester, each of the three syllables in this case having exactly the same signification. The old road from Bishop's Castle to Clun traverses a rough, hilly country, with scarce a place big enough to be called a village all the way. On the outskirts of the town stands Blunden Hall, a timbered mansion, old, but much modernized. Anon our way lies up-hill, with the tree-crowned summit of Bury Ditches rising boldly ahead.